The critiques of the Oilers are familiar now after so many losing seasons. They lack size, and need to bulk up in a big way. They lack quality at centre; NHL teams are not built from a core group made of wingers. They lack elite-level goaltending in a league that starts at the net and works its way out.

Fortunately for Edmonton, the Chicago Blackhawks have proven that a team can win the Western Conference even when facing those specific criticisms.

The Blackhawks were the second-smallest playoff team by weight in the West this season, with an average size (the average being weighted by ice-time) of 201.2 pounds. Only the Minnesota Wild, at 200.7 pounds, were a lighter team. Not only did Chicago manage to win all of their playoff series, but in the Conference Finals they faced the massive Los Angeles Kings – a team that with an average weight of over 210 pounds had a massive size advantage on the Blackhawks and was more than three pounds clear of second-ranked San Jose. The Kings were a trendy upset pick; instead, Chicago dispatched them in five games.

Centre depth has been a constant source of trouble for the Blackhawks. They spent most of the season looking for a second line centre; ultimately they had to settle for Michal Handzus, a 36-year old so lightly esteemed by the San Jose Sharks that they were willing to trade him to a Conference rival for a fourth-round pick even while fighting for position in a tight playoff race. To make matters worse, third-line centre Dave Bolland suffered multiple injuries down the stretch and ended up missing the entire first round with a groin injury. Andrew Shaw, a 5’10” sophomore who had 14 points in 28 games in the AHL during the lockout (and started the 2011-12 season in the minors) was pressed into action to make up the gap, leaving the Hawks with a playoff opening night depth chart of Jonathan Toews, Handzus, Shaw and Marcus Kruger. Aside from Toews, one of the best in the game, it’s not a particularly inspiring group and the insertion of a banged up Bolland only improves it so much (despite overtime play, his average ice-time is down four full minutes from the regular season).

In net, it was only a year ago that Chicago was seen as a juggernaut with goaltending the lone Achilles heel. Corey Crawford, the man who is arguably the team’s front-runner for the Conn Smythe Trophy, was a disaster in 2011-12, posting a 0.903 regular season save percentage and following it up with an even worse 0.893 save percentage in a six-game opening round loss to Phoenix. Now he’s playing the best hockey of his career and is getting mentioned as a plausible member of Canada’s 2014 Olympic team.

While the Oilers have a significant gap to bridge – chasm might be a more appropriate word – to get to the point where they can rival the ‘Hawks, what Chicago shows is that there is certainly no need to abandon the young core the Oilers have drafted; they simply need to find a way to augment it. An interesting exercise is to compare the Oilers regular season depth chart to the one Chicago has iced in the playoffs:

(I’ve taken some liberties with line combinations, since the idea here is to stress overall organizational depth. Bolland stays on the fourth line because that’s how he’s been used this post-season; he’s clearly playing through injury.)

Underlined players are ones who are clearly significantly better than the corresponding player on the other team’s depth chart; for example, while Ryan Nugent-Hopkins is a fine young player he isn’t the equal of Jonathan Toews at this point in time. Matchups with no underline indicate the lack of a clear gap between the two options; again for example, Andrew Shawn and Shawn Horcoff. There’s a case to be made that one player is better than the other, but there really isn’t that much of a gap.

Looking at the trend, despite similar positional strengths up front (i.e. the Hawks have four very good to elite forwards and three of them are wingers; the Oilers hope they have one elite forward and three others they hope get there and three of that group are wingers) there’s no doubt as to the better team. Chicago’s elite forwards are better, their depth forwards are better (despite a third-line draw), and their defence is much, much better.

What is interesting is that there’s no reason the Oilers’ forward core can’t get to the equivalent level of Chicago’s if players develop as hoped. Taylor Hall is already a phenomenal NHL forward, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Jordan Eberle are both very good and the former certainly has room to grow, while Nail Yakupov’s potential is still largely untapped. In the future, they could run two solid scoring lines in much the same way Chicago does now – two elite talents plus a useful support player (in Chicago’s case, Toews/Hossa plus Bickell or Saad) and one elite talent, one very good player plus a useful support player (again in Chicago’s case, Kane/Sharp plus Handzus). There’s nothing inherently special about Chicago’s depth forwards aside from the fact that their fourth line can play; certainly there’s nothing there the Oilers couldn’t manage with astute decision-making.

The news for the Oilers is even better in net; over the last three years Corey Crawford has been a 0.922 save percentage goalie at even-strength, while Devan Dubnyk has posted a 0.923 save percentage in the same situation. There is precious little daylight separating the two.

Defence remains a formidable problem. The Oilers are blessed with a wealth of good prospects and have a player in Justin Schultz with an unknown ceiling but a lot of potential; even so they don’t have a player certain to match Duncan Keith as one of the very best defencemen in the NHL.

Naturally, the Edmonton does not need to copy Chicago – there are a lot of different ways to put a winning club together, something Oilers GM Craig MacTavish noted in a May 24 interview on Oilers Now:

Success is always in vogue. You look at the New Jersey Devils when they won, you had to play a more conservative, trapping style of hockey, a less aggressive style of hockey. Then it transitioned to the Wings, and then you had to play a more skill-level game, a more puck-possession game. Now, the Los Angeles Kings have won the Stanley Cup last year and are threatening again this year with a big, heavy team. I think there are a lot of different ways you can get the job done.

What makes Chicago particularly compelling, though, is that they serve as valuable confirmation that if the Oilers core players develop as hoped, the majority of a Cup-contending nucleus might already be in place. No dramatic overhaul up front is needed; now it’s just a matter of upgrading the back end, helping the young stars grow, and adding the right mix of support players. Of course, that’s still a very significant challenge.

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